‘”He won’t reach the level he was at before the season started last year,” Ruff said Tuesday before the Sabres crushed the Boston Bruins, 7-1, in HSBC Arena. “There’s no chance of getting to that level of fitness. But we feel that we can get him to the level where he’ll play and help the team. I’m guessing in six to eight weeks.”‘

‘”It’s a step in the right direction,” said Briere, who played his first home game since earning All-Star MVP honors last Wednesday in Dallas. “We don’t want to get too confident because it’s just one game, but we needed this to realize that we’re OK here.”‘

‘”We were struggling with the one goal lead,” said Briere. “Tonight we made sure we didn?t stop with the one goal lead, we just kept scoring goals. We knew they played late last night, got in late. We wanted to get at them right from the beginning. We wanted to come out strong.”‘

‘With five minutes remaining in the period and Gaustad off for boarding Jason Pominville notched a short handed goal to give the Sabres a four goal lead. Then just minutes later Daniel Briere scored his second of the night and his twentieth of the season to make it 6-1 heading to the third.’

‘”It’s isn’t easy to fly in, get in late, not skate [in the morning] and try to find the energy to play the next night,” said head coach Lindy Ruff. ” It didn’t look like tonight they could generate any energy. And they are a good skating team.”‘

‘On a cold January eve at HSBC Arena, the red-light was flashing as the Sabres did the bashing, racing out of the gates with the desperation and hunger that had eluded their play in recent weeks, and steamrolling the Bruins in one of their patented offensive explosions.’

‘”Ryan needs a few days. He needs three or four good practices to get back into a groove,” Ruff said. “He’s played some situations differently. I haven’t seen just a relaxed state. It seems that everything is a little bit of a reaction here or a reaction there where some of it is reading the play, some of it looks like a little bit of frustration in his game. The fact that things haven’t gone the way he’s wanted them to go.”‘